(November 2009) MOST sounds evoke an image. Techno and electro might bring up cold industrial scapes or visions of concrete or derelict districts. Disco conjures up the shadows of 54 and the warm climate of Italia. Likewise, New Wave has an image; one of a bleak soulless city, of disaffection and burgeoning dole queues. It is for this reason that much of the New Wave sound made its way from post war nations, Britain, Germany, France and even the US to an extent. One country that flies in the face of such preconceptions is the holiday destination of Greece, with its sun soaked beaches and historic richness. Nevertheless, Greece is home to a growing New Wave label: ειρκτή/Eirkti. The imprint, like Minimal Wave, is focused on the New Wave revival, re-issuing New Wave, Cold Wave, Dark Wave and No Wave material lost on tapes from the past.
In 2008 Eirkti the dark broodings of Die Bunker. In 1983 Die Bunker released an audio tape album on V.I.S.A.. Most of the tracks were live recordings, with some being studio based. Eirkti have trawled through the forgotten archives to bring back this sound, now in LP form entitled Peut-Être Qu’il N’y A Plus Rien? The album is a sorrowful work of synthesizers and guitars. The tracks have an overarching darkness to them, a shadowy undercurrent of alienation and estrangement which is stressed through compositions. The synthlines shudder and swell under isobars of disaccord, with vocals merging into inaudible phonems. The tracks have been remastered, but the production still has a live graininess to it; adding to the distancing of the listener to the material.
From Die Bunker Eirkti are re-issuing actual Greek new wave. Χωρίς Περιδέραιο released a 7″ on Art Nouveau in 1983 and an LP in 1985 on Λαιστρυγόνα. Eirkti have brought back the latter. The LP moves in a different direction to Die Bunker, with a much more synth wave drive. Powerful vocals move with guitar rifts and a new found confidence. The album has an 80s energy, but one with an unmistakable new wave twist. The LP dips between instrumental and vocal tracks with a sense of speed and the electric age embedded in them.
Brigade Internationale are one of the label’s latest findings, with their Regard Extrěme LP. In 1984 the album came out on a cassette, now being available for the first time on vinyl. The tracks have a similar feel to those by Die Bunker. A gripping uneasiness sets in across the LP, with Brigade Internationale taking the listener down a dark path of tortured instruments and disillusioned vocals. The tracks have a desperation to them, one resembling the lackluster view of the world held by many in the new wave car crash set.
ειρκτή/Eirkti is pioneering the way in bringing back the sound of European disenchantment. The 1980s were a time of unbridled consumption coupled with the erosion of traditional industries. The concrete age had arrived, neo-liberalism gripped the western world and communism dug its heels into the east. The pages of history tell this, documented to the letter with opinions mounting opinions. But underneath the subjugation of some, and rise of others, musicians were mapping their interpretation of this world. The synthesizer would be hijacked, to an extent, in the later part of the 1980s, but in the early years it was a new tool to sonorously describe a new sense of disillusion. ειρκτή/Eirkti are retelling this tale of European estrangement, taking lost tapes and recordings and bringing them back. The 1980s was the culmination of almost eight decades of unseen change, the collapse of the old and the establishment of a new; this change, and the sights and sounds that came with it, were recorded and are once again available to hear.
For more information about Eirkti, visit their website at eirkti.com.
